Underwater vehicles can be used for numerous applications. Some common examples include oil and gas exploration, inspection and building of subsea infrastructure (e.g., pipeline), military applications, scientific research, marine life discovery and tracking, and others. Depending on the application, these vessels can be completely or partially autonomous, non-autonomous, or remote controlled.
Current oceanographic and underwater vessels ascend and descend through the ocean by changing the overall buoyancy of the vessel. However, these traditional buoyancy compensation systems typically change the overall buoyancy of the vessel by pumping fluid or gas in and out of external bladders or sections of the vessel. These types of systems consume large amounts of energy and require complex, high-pressure hydraulic systems with pumps, filters, valves, controls, etc. As such, there are a number of challenges and inefficiencies found in traditional buoyancy compensation systems.